Too Cool for School

Another day of unbearable temperatures making studying almost impossible for the children of Toronto schools. There is a simple solution for students who are completing the school year in sweltering classrooms “air conditioning”.

Parents from a Scarborough junior school are appealing to neighbourhood residents to lend extra fans to Birch Cliff Public School as students endure hours in sweltering classrooms.

“It’s very hard to motivate children when they’re very hot – and to teach them the last bits that need to be taught,” said teacher Kristine Petsinis.

The school, which is nearly 100 years old, does not have an air conditioning system.

The chairperson of the school’s parent council, Gail Ross, applauds teachers’ efforts to keep classrooms as cool as possible, but hopes more can be done as temperatures continued looming around 30 C on Thursday.

“They’re doing their best to close their blinds and drapes and keep the lights off and that sort of thing,” she said.

“We just need to make it something that the kids can sit in because it’s pretty hard to concentrate when it’s as hot as it is.”

Neighbourhoods lining Lake Ontario enjoyed some reprieve from temperatures which hovered around 25C on Thursday.

The lake is still very cool and helps to refrigerate the air around it. Shoreline temperatures were about 6 degrees cooler than in the rest of the city.

A thunderstorm warning has been issued for the Halton Region. Environment Canada suggests the possibility of torrential rain, hail and strong winds near Peason International Airport.